Memorable names who left Wolves - and came back

Maybe it's the whiff of hops from Banks's Brewery, the draw of having five Greggs in one city centre, or the magnetism of drinking goldfish-bowl-sized cocktails in Popworld at 2am on a Saturday morning...but some folk just find the place hard to resist.

Wolves players, it seems, are no different. With Benik Afobe the most recent player to be linked with a move back to Molineux.

Wolves correspondent Tim Spiers picks out a few names who left Wolves and came home.

Richard Stearman

“It feels amazing to be back. I think everybody knows what this club means to me.”

The words of Richard Stearman after he made a surprising Wolves comeback – on loan from Fulham – in 2016.

A year earlier the centre half had left for £2m – a controversial sale for the previous season’s player of the year, which Wolves insisted was for “footballing reasons”.

No one was buying that and his return was hit and miss, with Walter Zenga eschewing him and Paul Lambert embracing him. It also gave Stearman the highlight of his career, a goal in a famous 2-1 FA Cup win at Liverpool.

Neil Emblen

Graham Taylor once said he hoped Neil Emblen wouldn't be remembered for his first act as a Wolves player - treading on the ball in the opening seconds of his debut at home to Reading.

Well, he wasn't. In fact he is held in high regard as a loyal servant to the club who made no fewer than 234 appearances over two spells.

Emblen first joined from Mick McCarthy's Millwall for £600,000 in 1994 as Wolves began to splash the cash under Sir Jack Hayward, with Tony Daley and Steve Froggatt also snared for seven-figure fees.

Three years later came a shock departure to Crystal Palace for £1.8m - a big fee at the time.

But in 1998 he was back. Second time around the utility man cost Wolves £900,000 – the amount Palace still owed on the fee they signed Emblen for (which would have risen above £2m if he had played a set number of games for the Londoners).

Wolves got the best out of the fully committed Emblen in that second spell. He lasted another three years before Norwich came calling.

Emblen emigrated to New Zealand and became a successful manager - even taking charge of the New Zealand national side on a temporary basis.

And he remembers his time(s) at Molineux fondly, saying in an interview last year he always looks for Wolves' results first.

Leon Clarke

Up there with the Stearman u-turn for shock factor, Leon Clarke made an eyebrow-raising return to Molineux in 2014 - seven years after leaving.

The local lad scored 15 in 83 games (48 of those from the bench) after coming through the Wolves academy before leaving for Sheffield Wednesday in 2007.

His relationship with the Wolves fans was, it's safe to say, quite fraught at times, and things came to a head when Clarke put his finger to his lips in front of the South Bank, Rajiv van la Parra style, to celebrate a goal against Plymouth after being booed by his own supporters.

Then-manager Glenn Hoddle didn't mind, saying: "To be honest I don't think there's anything wrong with putting his finger to his lips - a lot worse happens in football these days."

But Clarke would later admit: "At the time there was a lot of immaturity from me."

Clarke led a nomadic existence after his first departure, playing for 11 (ELEVEN) clubs and finally finding prolific form with Coventry City, scoring 28 in 43 appearances (15 of those in just 23 games) leading to Kenny Jackett shelling out £750,000 to bring him home.

Sadly it didn't work out. The goals dried up (after scoring 18 for Coventry before the end of January in 2013/14, Clarke scored just once in 13 games as Wolves lifted the League One title.

He was released a year ago and Clarke, aged 31, is now with his 16th club in the form of Sheffield United, where Ethan Ebanks-Landell is his new team mate.

Bill McGarry

They say never go back. Bill McGarry probably wished he'd heeded that advice.

McGarry was one of the most successful managers in Wolves' long and prestigious history, leading a renaissance in the early 1970s after the mediocrity of the 1960s post-Stan Cullis era.

McGarry guided Wolves to finishes of fourth (1970/71) and fifth (1972/73) in the top flight, the Uefa Cup final (1972) and of course that glorious League Cup final win over Manchester City (1974).

A poor 1976 campaign in which Wolves were surprisingly relegated, leaving McGarry dumbstruck, was his undoing and he resigned that summer.

Nine years later, after stints in the United Arab Emirates, he answered his old club's call when they were reaching their lowest ebb in 1985, hurtling forwards the Fourth Division.

But it was a very different Wolves to the one he had left behind - and McGarry lasted just 61 days before quitting again with Wolves in complete disarray.

McGarry said the infamous Bhatti brothers had made his job impossible and added: "I am not going to be party to the killing of one of the finest clubs in the world."

Ironically his departure paved the way for another Wolves comeback, with Sammy Chapman returning as manager just a few months after leaving.

McGarry died in 2005, aged 77.

Paul Jones

A very able goalkeeper who joined Wolves from Kidderminster Harriers in 1991 as back-up to Mike Stowell.

He was destined to play second fiddle - and played only 44 times in five years.

The most famous of these was without doubt his 1995 FA Cup penalty shoot-out heroics against Sheffield Wednesday at Molineux.

With Wolves 3-0 down in the shoot-out against their Premier League opponents, Jones saved from Chris Bart-Williams (as he had done in the first game at Hillsborough) and, spectacularly, Chris Waddle, who was taking his first penalty since *that* World Cup Italia '90 miss.

Jones later said he predicted Waddle would shoot in the opposite direction to his Turin nightmare.

The keeper left in search in first-team football and his career duly took a huge upturn, first via Stockport County and then Southampton, both under Dave Jones, with the latter in the Premier League where Jones established himself as one of the best keepers in the division.

He even joined Liverpool on loan, before making a surprise return to Molineux in 2004 aged 36 to replace Michael Oakes for the rest of that top-flight campaign under, you guessed it, Dave Jones, who said: "For me it was a massive mistake when Wolves let Paul go."

Another 26 Wolves appearances followed for a man who won 50 Wales caps.

Tony Daley, Seyi Olofinjana and Rob Edwards

Tony Daley, Seyi Olofinjana and Rob Edwards all played in gold and black - and all returned after retiring to take jobs on the club's coaching staff.

Daley was a huge signing for Wolves in 1994 but made just 27 appearances in four injury-blighted years. Ironically upon retiring Daley explored a career in fitness - and has been a key man behind modernising Wolves' fitness and training methods since returning as as fitness and conditioning coach in 2007.

Popular midfielder Olofinjana played for Wolves from 2004 to 2008 before moving to Stoke for £3m, with Mick McCarthy saying at the time: "He's been fantastic to work with - a really good player."

Not your average footballer (Olofinjana has a degree in chemical engineering) he's now back at Compton Park working as a coach in the club's academy.

Edwards' Molineux career reflected Olofinjana's in terms of years (2004 to 2008) and the defender played more than 100 times in gold and black, as well as earning a number of Wales caps.

Injuries led him to retiring aged just 30 - but in 2014 he was back at the club as an academy coach. Extremely highly-rated by those at the club, Edwards was promoted to first-team coach under Kenny Jackett and retained the role under Walter Zenga.

He now manages AFC Telford in National League North, a club which also boasts former striker Sylvan Ebanks-Blake.

A mention too for Ludovic 'Ludo' Pollet who now scouts for the club in France (and has spotted a few bargains in the past couple of years).

But the less said about Chris Iwelumo's return to Wolves, the better.